A new version of Porsche’s mid-engined sports car is not coming soon.
We’ve been used to expecting new versions of the Boxster, and Cayman each year after a new 911 chassis launches. However, this is not the case this year. Road & Track interviewed Porsche’s August Achleitner during the Geneva Motor Show to learn more about the unexpected development.
Euro 7 emissions laws, which are even stricter than the Euro 6, will soon be in effect. This will have a significant impact on sports car manufacturers. Achleitner said that “The European situation isn’t really enjoyable because there’s an trend to change these emissions requirements with dramatic speed which doesn’t fit at all to the development times in automotive industry.”
This means that politicians making engineering decisions can be a problem for both manufacturers and consumers. Porsche seems to want to keep the Boxster/Cayman around, but we’ll have to wait a while until we get a new one. We are fine with that, in all honesty.
Although the 718 Boxster and Cayman have a basic architecture that dates back to 2012 it is not what we would call “dated.” We’d actually say that it’s still one of the most desirable mid-engine sports cars (Road & Track’s Chris Perkins concurs). It’s also a relatively low-volume Porsche car, so they won’t be spending any development money on it anytime soon.
Porsche will continue to update its sports cars with special editions such as the Cayman GT4. Achleitner claims that the current car will be around until at most 2023. It’s worth looking at it from a half-full perspective. We get four more years of one Porsche’s most iconic cars.